My Little Ventrue Pt. 04 Ch. 13

But humans were a more difficult enemy to manage. How does one find and expunge a kine, hidden within the millions of her city?

She sighed, and grit her teeth. On top of all this, Clara's words still echoed in her mind. Someone else was tampering with the realm of spirits, according to her, and it had the werewolf concerned. If it concerned Avery, then it concerned Antoinette.

A new mission for Daniel.

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"Beatrice Damor, and... Eric, was it?"

"Eric Tanverson," he said, nodding. An elbow from Triss in the side was enough to get the man to bow in a similar manner to the Nosferatu.

"I must thank the both of you. If not for your interference, my beloved would be dead." She waited, to see if either of them would speak, or if they understood that it was best for them to be quiet. Eric opened his mouth, but he caught on quickly, and closed it as she smirked, and stood up. "Miss Damor, I understand that you not only rescued Mister Terry from hunters, but that you went into the realm of the Begotten."

"Yes, my Prince," she said. Oh, delightful, that she was learning to play the game, titles and all. "Pretty terrifying shit, nightmare realms. Saw a huge cave, and a giant jungle with two moons. The scariest shit though was that Jeremiah person. Man knew what he was doing. Him and his hunters had special knives that seemed pretty weird, oddly dangerous somehow. And they were really good with their pistols, and Jeremiah himself had grenades coming out of his ass, and—"

Antoinette held up a hand, and nodded. "Hunters are forever experts at the tools of their trade, young Nosferatu. And to our chagrin, their tools have grown impressive the past couple centuries. Where once our largest worries were torches and swords, now we deal with rifles, flamethrowers, grenades as you mentioned, and worst of all, digital communication. In the past, for news to spread between hunters took weeks, or months, and through word of mouth, misinformation was common. Now, if one of these hunters manages to capture a picture of something important, they can share it with their associates anywhere in the world in the blink of an eye. Now, more than ever, we have to be careful."

"I uh... maybe I shouldn't have driven in there with a car then," she said.

"Perhaps. No doubt the hunters are now educated to your presence and visage, but for the moment, my concern is more so about the revelations you have made to this man." She gestured toward Eric. Like Beatrice, he was a mess, but unlike Beatrice, he was alive. Flesh, a man, who smelled of blood and the mud of a jungle. A strange odor, to be sure. "I understand that Fiona accidentally brought this man into the fold. Is that true, Mister Tanverson?"

"Er, yeah." He squirmed. There was something to this Eric Tanverson, something odd, something she could not quite place her finger on. "She was looking for Jack, thought I might have seen him, since I work at Bloodlust. But she mentioned four people, and I had seen those. We managed to follow them, and... everything... went to hell."

Sunrise was in an hour. It had been a long night for everyone involved, but perhaps no one was suffering the stress of tonight as much as this poor fool. Eric Tanverson, an attractive man, black, with a shaved head and face, and some grit to his dark brown eyes. Ganders no doubt hired him due to the sexual allure of his hard personality, the brooding, dark, handsome motif. The total opposite of Fiona.

Such a strange girl. First Damien and now this Tanverson. The girl was too young to understand these bitter fools were sexually appealing, but emotionally damaged, and often incapable of maturing past the point of that damage. She would learn some day, no doubt, about why a girl flirts with a bad boy, but does not bring him home.

"But, um," Beatrice said, "I am worried about them, or Fiona at least. That Jeremiah fuck was... he wasn't normal, my Prince. Didn't feel normal at all."

"The hunters have fled the abandoned prison, but I suspect you are right to fear this Jeremiah. I will direct my concerns to him, and see that Daniel's eyes are kept open for this man." She stepped around the desk, and began to pace to and fro in front of it, with the two visitors waiting on her word. It was clear to see that Eric was surprised by her; the white hair and red eyes were no doubt the cause, as well as her height. But the man adapted, and she smirked as he stood up straighter. "Have either of you spoken with the Begotten since the encounter with Jeremiah?"

"Um, no, my Prince," the Nosferatu said. "But, she's friends with a lot of us. And on our way out, Azamel said Jeremiah's intrusion was probably just him testing the waters of the lair. He wouldn't be able to get anywhere from his... uh, position in the lair? Whatever that meant. She was sure he'd run when Mark arrived."

Antoinette sighed, a disappointed sigh, and emphasized the sound a little to let Beatrice know she was not happy about the lack of information. And Jacob probably would not be either. It had been a prime opportunity for the girl to learn something about this human named Jeremiah, and instead she had rushed toward her goal. Her goal to save Jack though; thus, Antoinette could only summon so much annoyance.

"And now we have you, Eric Tanverson, a human, who knows of us. A Masquerade violation on Fiona's part. It—"

"It wasn't a violation. Shit went to hell and the only way I could save her life was by getting her back to her nightmare world lair thing, or whatever. She—"

Antoinette sprinted into the man's personal space, appeared there in but a fraction of a second, a window of time the man did not have the reflexes to react to, before she set her hand around his throat. She squeezed it as she glared down at him, cut through his eyes with her own, and forced the man to his knees as he reached up to grab her wrists. The need to breathe was a terrible weakness to have.

"Do not interrupt me, Eric Tanverson. In any other circumstance, I would either see you dead or a thrall at my whim. The only reason I spare you is because your interference has ultimately led to my beloved's second life being spared. You are in my world now, child. I rule this city, and you are but a tiny cog in its machinery. I am the Prince of its denizens of the night, and people like yourself are normally food. Expendable. Understood?"

The fool man managed a nod, despite how tight her grip was, and despite how she could see the asphyxiation start to manifest on him, with veins bulging and eyes growing wide. Fear. Good. Fear was a powerful teacher.

She let him go, and he fell to his knees, coughing. No room to be kind, no room to spare his feelings, as every month brought with it new hardships that required a firm hand. Her city was falling apart underneath her, and she would have to fix it.

"You will be watched, Eric. I have eyes everywhere. If you so much as even entertain the notion of exposing our kind, then you will join my dungeon as a food source. I will remove your hands and feet, tie you to a wall, drip an IV bag into your veins, and give your blood to hungry Kindred for months before I finally decide to simply stop replacing your source of nutrients. I will let you die of thirst, cold, and alone. Do I make myself clear?"

Her words earned a greater fear still, proper fear, the cold sword strike of fear to the heart, that lasted and carved into the soul. She did not enjoy the use of its power, unlike Jacob, unlike Nosferatu in general, but it was a valuable tool nonetheless. He stood up, nodded, and adopted the most rigid, military posture she imagined the man capable of with his apparently damaged knee.

"Yes ma'am."

"My Prince, Mister Tanverson. I am your Prince."

"... yes, my Prince."

Again, something told her there was more to this man, but she could not understand what it was. Perhaps the thrall she would have shadow the man would answer the peculiarity, with time.

"Now that you understand how we do business, here in the heart of my city, you may rest easy, Mister Tanverson. You have done me a great service and I will be sure no Kindred or Begotten or Uratha harm you. Given time, you may find yourself to grow fond of the night life, and of the creatures that live within it."

"... yes, my Prince."

Utterly, deliciously perfect. The man was afraid of her, and a terrified being was one that could be crafted, molded, altered to fit the desired role. Lucky for Tanverson that she was a kind ruler.

"Since you work at Bloodlust, you will no doubt encounter creatures of the night on a regular basis. They will undoubtedly come to know you, and you will come to know them. And now with the threat of these hunters knowing your face, I will instruct the Invictus to keep an eye on Bloodlust, with a constant Kindred presence. It is in there territory, after all."

Triss raised her hand up to her shoulder height, like a child trying to get attention without seeming too obvious. How quaint. Antoinette nodded in her direction to give her permission to speak.

"Erik's actually already in it deep with the Invictus. Jessy's doing him a favor with some kine business, so now she's got her eye on him. Pretty sure she wants to bang him."

Antoinette laughed, and leaned back to set her butt against the edge of her desk as she folded her arms underneath her bosom. "My dear boy, if Beatrice speaks true, you will be bathed in the pleasure of sex and the Kiss all too soon."

The man squirmed, winced, but nodded. Other men would jump for joy if they knew of the pleasures Antoinette spoke of, and even in ignorance, they would still be excited. Not Eric Tanverson though. No, as she suspected, the man had baggage, was emotionally damaged, and likely wanted nothing more than to disappear from all the changes in his life, these new twists that were thrust upon him against his will.

Perhaps a night with Jessy's flesh wrapped around his member and her teeth in his neck would change his mind? Antoinette tapped a finger on her chin as she looked at the man, and considered. Probably not, but, the man's presence would at least bring a new life to Bloodlust, in a strange way. She looked forward to seeing the results.

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~~Jack~~

Jack woke up.

Well, that was a pleasant change from what a part of him was expecting. How he knew he might not wake up, when he was asleep, he wasn't sure, but there was a tiny part of him that was genuinely surprised that he got to open his eyes and see the ceiling of—where the fuck was he? Groaning, he sat up, pain working through him as the wounds of the previous night struggled to heal.

He had hands. Oh thank fucking god he had hands again. He wasn't sure he'd be able to regrow them at his age, and might have spent a few years without them. Fingers worked, thumbs worked, he could squeeze and grip again, and he tested them all as held them out in front of him.

He was lying on a bed, a nice one, elegant, big. There was a desk against the nearby wall with a laptop on it, and the room had wardrobes and some curtains and a rug and all the fancy frills the rich liked to waste on decor. Seemed like Viktor's sense of decor too, so that would make this the underground bunker in Viktor's mansion.

He looked down. Still in the clothes he was wearing yesterday, and still with some very blatant holes in his body, flesh torn open, parts of his musculature exposed; Kindred insides were dried, withered things, and didn't look very nice with the skin off. He slid his feet off the bed and tried to stand, or at least that was the plan, but the moment he tried to move his feet he fell back and groaned into grit teeth. The ankle still wasn't healed, so he wasn't going anywhere without a wheelchair.

No wonder he'd managed to regrow his hands. All his healing had gone into regrowing them, and hadn't managed to fix anything else.

"Still alive I see."

Jack twitched, and looked to his side. Julias slid off the bed, and straightened out his suit pants and his white shirt. The suit jacket was on a chair by the desk, and the man sat down as he put on his shoes. Must have slept beside him on the bed; it was certainly big enough.

"I want to say no thanks to Triss, she ran me over. But, considering the circumstances, yeah, I owe her my life."

His sire smiled, nodded, and turned the desk chair around to sit in it reverse while facing him.

"The Invictus owe you an apology."

"Because you didn't see this coming?"

"Exactly."

"Eh, they're humans, Julias. Kind of hard to figure out what they're up to when they blend into the rest of the city so well."

His sire sighed, but nodded again. No doubt the man was feeling guilty, and every time he glanced Jack's way, he winced.

"You managed to escape though. Maybe not fully escape, but you... managed to do some impressive shit, Jack."

"... thanks." Jack lay back on the bed, and gulped on nothing as he pushed aside the pain. Hungry, very hungry, all his vitae gone to try and heal, and he needed more. But Julias already knew that, and would get him a meal from one of his thralls or something. This conversation was too important to interrupt.

"Fill me in on the details."

Jack nodded, and recounted the tale. He told him about Jeremiah and Angela with the glass eye, told him about being tortured, told him about the handcuffs, told him about how he managed to push past its weird magic, dominate the two hunters, summon an army of rats, told him about dealing with the backlash, running through fire, and told him about getting run over. What a night, what a horrible, shitty fucking night.

"I was... surprised," Jack said, "about the rats. I... I didn't expect that to happen, to be able to summon so many of them."

"We were equally surprised by the amount we found. Jessy and I were there to monitor the clean up. Amanda was there too. No one expected to find what we found, to see that many dead rats."

Yeah, dead rats. Sounded so simple to say, but he didn't like that so many died for him. Killing humans, seeing them die, drinking someone to death, those were eating him up too, but the dead rats, that was different. The beast inside him didn't getting them killed.

"... so... what now?"

"Now," Julias said, "the Invictus act. The hunters underestimated you, and you hurt them for it. So now we begin the hunt, and start the search for their group. Jeremiah and Angela are the x-factors we didn't see coming, but now we know about them. We won't make that mistake again."

"Guess we were too focused on the four humans to consider that something bigger was going on." Jack sighed, and stared up at the ceiling of the luxurious bunker room. Weight pushed him down into the bed, and more than just his body's. "... do you think Damien had anything to do with this?"

"Because you talked to him last, before you were kidnapped?"

"Yeah. I... have trouble suspecting him. After all the shit that's happened between him and I, I can't see him just betraying me like that. And he did warn me that something like this might happen. I should have been more on guard, more careful."

"Hard to be on guard for humans, especially in Dolareido where there's millions of them in a tight space." Julias turned around, and typed a few things into his laptop before looking back to Jack again. "I'll get a couple thralls down here for some food for you, kid. Drink up and sleep. You'll need another two or three days of sleep to heal the rest of your wounds I imagine, at least to the point you can move again."

Sleep, yeah, he could do that. He could feel it, feel his body, his beast, wanting to slumber and let the damage fade away; once he'd eaten.

"I—"

"I'll look into the Damien thing, Jack. He might not want to kill you anymore, but Maria might if she ever found out about Lucas. Then again, maybe not. Last I spoke to her, she seemed to understand how vile a man he was."

"Maybe... people in love don't usually act rationally, Julias."

"True, too true." The man adjusted his suit, his tie, and started toward the exit. "You did damn good Jack, and it's no secret this time. Every vamp in the city, and werewolf and monster too, is going to know what you managed to accomplish. The Invictus will honor this, promote you, give you a raise, and see that your future tasks reflect someone of your stature."

"... Julias, give it to me straight... is this how Viktor started out?"

His sire froze. Rare, to see Julias freeze, to see his shoulders and limbs come to a dead stop, and his hand reaching out for the exit lever froze too.

"You're worried about it too, then?"

"... I guess I am, yeah." He raised his hands again, and squeezed at the air to make sure they were working, that they were real. "And you are too, apparently."

"None of us will ever be able to predict where we'll be in a century's time, Jack. Viktor was a... different man. He changed with time, in strange ways, and—"

"I get it, I get it. I have no idea who I'll be in fifty fucking years, after I've killed how many more people. Twenty-one years old, and I'm starting to build up a list."

"... you had no choice, Jack."

"I know. I know and I get that, and I don't need you to convince me it's ok for a Kindred to defend themselves. Hell you don't even need to convince me it's ok for Kindred to kill kine; we're not the same species, we're the predator, I get that. Just... fucking christ. I..." Maybe he did have some growing up to do. But he didn't want to grow up into Viktor. Where the fuck did that leave him? What sort of stupid, sick, twisted game was this, walking some sort of knife edge.

Julias came back to him, stood beside the bed, and looked down at him with a strange look. An adult look. God, Jack hated that look. Reminded him of the conversations his mom would have with her friends, not long after their dad died. That serious, adult, sympathetic but serious look. A look he didn't want to be on the receiving end of, but he knew he probably damn well needed it.

"Kid, you have me, and you have Antoinette. You have a lot of years to go before you ever have to worry about the things that made Viktor who he was. Honestly, I'm surprised you asked."

"I... when I reached out to break their minds, those hunters, and I realized I could, that I could break them like puppets, I... thought of Viktor, I guess. I knew he could do that too, that he had a talent for it, and then I remembered all the rats he summoned, and... and I knew, if I wanted to get out of their alive, I had to be able to do what Viktor would do, and willing to do it too."

His sire winced, reached down, and touched his shoulder. "It was a smart play."

There was more. He remembered how much he wanted to kill them, these humans that had the fucking nerve to try and capture him, torture him. He remembered the taste of violence on his tongue, and how satisfying it'd been to wreak havoc on the hunters who had the audacity to try and kill him. It was the words, it was how his mind had formulated the thought that got under his skin, that made him think about Viktor.

'How dare they.'

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~~Eric~~

He still had his job.

One call to Ganders, a five minute call after the meeting with the Prince, to get the situation sorted out. Apparently knowing the name 'Invictus' was enough to get Ganders nervous, and excited. When Eric mentioned meeting someone by title of 'Prince', Ganders about lost it, exclaiming things like 'I knew you were the right choice!' and such, all while Eric just listened. Man loved his job way too much. Dracula's thrall then, maybe? Eric smirked at the thought of the man haunched over, saying 'master, master' over and over.

The only problem was Ganders was only willing to give him two days off. He had to be in for the third. Told him he could sit down for the shift, but he needed to be there, because if what Eric was saying was true, then the Invictus would want him there. Apparently, they'd probably have someone over to talk to him, and set things straight. Delightful.